A Willing Murder (Medlar Mystery 1)
The detective put the computer on the table and opened the file folder. “District Chief Edison—I believe that, locally, he was referred to as ‘Captain’—kept excellent records and we pulled all of them.” He looked at Jack with an intense stare. “You were quite young, so I doubt if you know all of what went on.”
“Some of it,” Jack said. He was leaning against the cushions, his arms spread across the back, looking as though he hadn’t a care in the world. But Kate was close enough that she felt him tense up.
Detective Cotilla held up the folder. “I have copies of the reports that Captain Edison wrote about your case.”
“My case?” Jack asked.
“The one your father filed about you,” Detective Cotilla clarified.
Jack didn’t reply, just nodded.
Daryl Flynn was watching in silence, a smile on his face that was very near to being a smirk.
“Everything is from the summer of 1997. The first report is of Roy Wyatt accusing Cheryl Morris of molesting his eleven-year-old son.”
Again, Jack nodded, but he said nothing.
Sara took the paper and Kate leaned toward her to read it. It was written in the police procedural way, telling only the facts, but it managed to convey Roy’s anger. Jack had told the same story, but this time, the sympathy went to Roy. He was portrayed as an angry man who was looking out for the well-being of his young son.
Sara handed the paper to Jack, but he didn’t take it. She put it on the table.
The second report told of Captain Edison going to the site with a very agitated boy, Jack Wyatt, to check on his “girlfriend.” The report told of the house having been cleaned out, as though the tenants had left in a hurry. There was me
ntion of the boy’s distress and it was noted that, contrary to what the father had said, the boy didn’t seem to have been abused.
“He wasn’t abused,” Kate said. Jack wasn’t defending himself and Sara was silent, so she spoke up.
But Sara put her hand on her niece’s arm. “What else do you have?”
Detective Cotilla held out another report. “As I said, Captain Edison was a very thorough man. After the boy—” he glanced at Jack “—came to him, the captain revisited Roy Wyatt. He wanted a clearer picture of what had gone on that summer.” He handed the women the pages.
Captain Edison wrote that when he told what he’d found, Roy got very angry. He said that yes, he’d gone back to the Morris house and demanded that Cheryl stay away from his son. He said Cheryl had given him a cock-and-bull story about her and Jack taking pictures of each other. She even showed him a camera that had Henry Lowell’s name etched on the side.
Roy said he demanded the return of the camera and all the film that had been shot with it. The young woman gave all of it to him and he left.
The captain said Roy stated that when he returned home he watched the films and was sickened. He wanted to take it all to the sheriff, but he didn’t want to humiliate his son by letting others see what had been done to him. But to prove what he was saying, Roy had cut pieces of the videos out and put them on DVD, which he turned over to Captain Edison.
Jack was still leaning back, still refusing to participate in what was going on. But when Sara handed him the third paper, he read it.
They all saw the blood creep up Jack’s neck and into his face.
When Kate and Sara leaned back onto the cushions beside Jack, the three of them presented a unified front.
Jack handed the paper to Kate and she put it on the table. Sara nodded toward the computer. “I guess you have the DVD that Roy made.”
“Yes, we do.” Detective Cotilla flipped open the laptop and turned it on. “Sorry, but there’s no sound.”
The first video was of an eleven-year-old Jack sitting at a table staring at the camera. He was a very pretty boy. Dark hair with curls, thick eyelashes and eyebrows, full lips.
Kate turned to look at him but he was staring at the screen.
They saw the back of a blonde female head go to him and kiss his cheek. When she walked away, her face couldn’t be seen, but Jack looked like he was about to melt. Young love was in his eyes. It would have been sweet except for what they knew had happened.
The next clip was a profile of Cheryl. Just her cheek could be seen, but her body was in clear view. She was built! A tight red skirt hugged her curvy backside and showed off her little waist. She had on dark hose and four-inch heels.
She was bending over Jack, who was curled up on the floor. The lack of sound didn’t hide the fact that he was saying, “No! No!” From Jack’s story, they knew he was laughing, but in the video, it looked like he was begging her to stop—but she wouldn’t.
The third clip was the worst. It showed Cheryl sitting behind an old table, talking to the camera. She was pretty, yes, but what made Kate involuntarily suck in her breath was that the girl looked to be in her late twenties, maybe older. She had on a lot of makeup. Her shoulder-length hair had been twisted back into a soft chignon, and she wore pearl earrings. Her white shirt didn’t hide her impressive bust.